Docandie LOVES Chilli's cutting board. It looks like it would be perfect as a cheese board or a bread board. Docandie has an "antique" round breadboard a friend brought her from England several decades ago. It has a wood-burned picture of a thatched cottage on it that looks like it was "branded' into the wood from a metal pattern. She will try to find it and take a photo. It has a carved "braid" around the outer edge.

Aunty wanders in and warns everyone to keep their distance as she as an 'orrible colb.

Aunty is both excited and nervous because she has just transferred her enrolment to a Masters of Information Studies (Librarianship) next year. She started a Diploma this year because she was too chicken to apply for a Masters but the TAFE wasn't really well set up to support distance ed students, so it has been a frustrating year for her. On top of that she has worked out that she could possibly finish the Masters in the time it would still take her to finish the Diploma So, she is going to have to make the most of some on-line catch-up time for the next few weeks as her nose will be well and truly to the grindstone next year!

On a different note Aunty must post some pictures of her garden which is full of flowers, bees and butterflies at the moment. It looks lovely just now, but if she waits too long summer will settle in and dry everything up!

Oh, and she almost forgot to say that she think's Jo's leadlight panel is beautiful - that's a skill Aunty would love to learn!

Jo thanks you, Auntie! She says it is not hard to do. The place Jo used to work hired new builders by giving aptitude tests and then hiring the ones who showed promise, and trained them on the job. There are hundreds of free patterns online if one knows where to look. The hardest part for her now is getting lead. The glass was free when she was working for a stained glass studio - employees got leftover glass for free, and she has accumulated about a lifetime supply, even though she no longer works there. Solder and flux are cheap and readily available. But the lead she used to buy from the studio at cost she now must purchase online and pay shipping, which for lead is very high due to the weight. She needs to locate the nearest supplier and make a run with a pickup truck to lay in a supply. Maybe Des Moines, but it is unlikely. Probably Minneapolis or Chicago.

I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be.--Douglas Adams

Bonnie has finally gotten around to posting some more photos up on her FB account. The lastest are from her office Christmas party which was aboard the Napa Wine Train. Here is a piccie of her and a coworker standing outside on the tail end of the caboose:

Now she is stuffed and trying not to fall asleep after the yummy meal.